Pope Francis, born Jorge Mario Bergoglio in Buenos Aires, Argentina, was the first in a long line of 266 popes to be from South America and the first born outside of Europe since the 8th century. The pope, also the first to be a member of the Jesuit Order, was beloved by many progressive Catholics and lauded for his priorities of uplifting marginalized communities, protecting immigrants and advocating for environmental justice. According to a 2024 Pew Research Center survey, about 75% of U.S. Catholics viewed Pope Francis favorably.

But he was also a polarizing figure. He struggled to manage the ongoing sexual abuse crisis that plagued his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI. Pope Francis met with survivors and attempted to pass reforms within the Church, but victims continue to come forward.

In his 12 years as pontiff, Pope Francis forged a legacy of compassion, humanity, and joy. The pope’s concern for social justice was on the mind of many mourning his death. From climate change to global poverty, war and violence, LGBTQ+ people and women’s roles in the church, Francis was remembered not just for his teachings or leadership on hot-button topics, but also the Argentine’s pastoral approach to the people caught up in them. 

Pope Francis, the first Latin American leader of the Roman Catholic Church, has died, the Vatican said on Monday, ending an often turbulent reign marked by division and tension as he sought to overhaul the hidebound institution.

In this week’s conversation with writer and novelist Alessandra Harris, we spoke about her love of writing and when she first realized she wanted to be a writer. She was in fourth grade and the story she had written about a genie was chosen by her teacher to receive a prize. When you’re a kid, there’s just something extremely compelling about the fantasy of encountering a genie who will grant you wishes galore. Of course, as a kid, our wishes are rather innocent and self-centered: “I wish I could meet Michael Jordan,” “I wish the Chicago Bulls could win one more championship,” and, last but not least, “I wish for more wishes.” As you grow up, you realize genies aren’t real but that doesn’t prevent you from imagining what you’d wish for if you had three, two, or even a single wish. And as we age, our wishes tend to transform into a single hope for something innocent and unselfish.

Scorsese, talking about his upcoming film on the life of Jesus, told the Los Angeles Times: “I’m trying to find a new way to make it more accessible and take away the negative onus of what has been associated with organized religion.”

The Vatican on Thursday moved to calm Catholic bishops in some countries who have balked over last month's approval of blessings for same-sex couples, telling them that the measure is not “heretical” or “blasphemous.” In a five-page statement, the Vatican's doctrinal office also acknowledged that such blessings could be “imprudent” in some countries where people who receive them might become targets of violence, or risk prison or even death.

Pope Francis called for an end to attacks and violence in Israel and Gaza on Sunday, saying terrorism and war would not solve any problems, but only bring further suffering and death to innocent people.

A group of Catholic Church abuse victims and their advocates on Wednesday called on Pope Francis to enforce “zero tolerance” against clerical sex abuse, after completing a six-day pilgrimage to Rome carrying a large wooden cross.

WHEN POPE FRANCIS visited Canada in July 2022, he said he was “deeply sorry” for the abuses inflicted upon peoples from First Nations by more than a century of Catholic-run residential schools. Francis decried the ways “many Christians supported the colonizing mentality of the powers that oppressed the Indigenous peoples,” which resulted in “cultural destruction and forced assimilation.”

To his credit, the pontiff acknowledged that his apology was not “the end of the matter,” and that serious investigation of what was perpetrated and enabled by the church was necessary for the survivors of the schools “to experience healing from the traumas they suffered.”

In the United States, the Seneca Nation is paving a path toward that healing process in their homelands, in particular from harm caused by a Presbyterian-run residential school.

A month after the pope’s apology, Matthew Pagels, then-president of the Seneca Nation — which historically inhabited territory throughout the Finger Lakes and Genesee Valley regions of New York — announced a new initiative to compile and catalog a list of residential school attendees.

To lead the effort, Pagels tapped Sharon Francis, a member of the Wolf Clan of the Seneca Nation and program coordinator at the Seneca Nation crime victims unit. Her passion, she said, is helping her communities heal from personal, intergenerational, and historical traumas.